Locust Test Palettes

Haven't decided on any particular features yet, so the quick sketch here doesn't have any included. Pretty sure all this was done in an hour or less, but I've got a bad habit of not timing myself when I draw.

Testing out different options for colors and patterns here. I think I'm leaning toward the green one, at least for the palette. Then I just need to decide on the facial features and experiment with the thing a little, throw in some body armor, and I'll have myself a finalized Locust redesign. Phew.

Locust Facial Detail

Feeling much better today! So, I worked on putting some of the promised extra features to the Locust redesign head.

Not sure which features I like the most, so I'll put it up to a vote as to which one (or combination) seems best-suited. Next up on the slate: Locust color palettes.

Character Interlude

I've been feeling subtly awful all day, so while my body gets back to normal, have this quick character bust I drew yesterday. Just line and some flat colors.

The Gears Locust redesigns are in fact going somewhere, but I've felt too ill and off-balance today to do any drawing. I've already slapped this on Facebook, so I may as well put it here as well for a preview of things to come.

It's more of a base for further experimentation with features than it is an exact final concept, and I'm not certain on the color scheme yet (another thing I'll be playing with once I'm feeling better). For now, this is the progress.

Update Time

My word, a post? Amazing.

First up, since it's been getting neglected, Gears redesign scribbles:

Went with light-on-dark to trick my recent almost-slump into un-slumping. It seems to have worked. Started off with an almost dinosaur look, but it wasn't quite alien enough. Pushed forward to the six-legged one, which I rather like. Think I'll be sticking with that as a base. Next time on these I'll have some more finished ideas. Less rough.

And here's the next in those Pokemon desktops.

Yes, I still exist

Wow, so, been a while, huh? Got into a slump and then got depressed and had a little bit of a breakdown before recovering from that, and now I'm feeling more inspired and confident. Now if I can just keep Minecraft from burning through all of my time while I'm not at work, I'll be able to get things done.

So it came up some time ago in a conversation with a friend of mine that I really, really dislike designs in the Gears of War series. I decided, I said, that when I got some time I would sit down and put my money where my mouth was, in a manner of speaking, and do some redesigns. I was also spurred to try this out by the excellent redesigns of the Justice League, Batman, and Legion of Doom by Aaron Diaz. You should really take a look at those if you haven't yet, by the way.

While I won't be going so in-depth as to rewrite character histories, I do want to find a better, more distinct look for a few things in Gears, though. And let's get this out of the way, too: I've only played a portion of the second game. And I did have fun with what I played, even if the writing had about as much subtlety as a house on fire. All that said, I've done a little bit of reading on the wiki to get a better grasp on the Gears creatures, characters, and conflict.

So to kick things off, I thought I'd start with the basic Locust Grunt. Apparently, they're supposed to be reptilian. I never knew this until I read it. I never even guessed. I guess the Locust are threatening by... being large and ugly? but then again so are the main characters, and both groups have the same basic stumpy, burly look to them. The Locust really don't look that inhuman, all told. Especially the Queen. Someone please explain that one to me.

Since they're supposedly reptilian, I thought I'd push that angle a little more:

It's all pretty quick, but there are some basic ideas. All in all maybe 30 minutes to an hour, I really need to remember to keep track of time when I'm drawing. Based mostly in lizards and lastly in pit vipers. I want to get a good idea of a face and skull before I get into how the body's going to look, so these are really just the start of the busts for the Locust.